1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an electrical connector, and particularly to an electrical connector having a reduced height above a printed circuit board.
2. The Related Art
U.S. Pat. No. 5,232,379 discloses an electrical connector comprising an insulative body and two rows of terminals. The two rows of terminals have mating portions, retaining portions and mounting portions, wherein one of said two rows of terminals have bending portions at the retaining portions for adjusting the space between two neighbouring mounting portions. Because the bending portions are positioned at the outside of the insulative body, it is difficult to decrease the width of the connector in the direction along which said mating portions extend. U.S. Pat. No. 5,567,171 discloses an electrical connector comprising an insulative body and two rows of terminals. Each terminal has a mating portion, a retaining portion and a mounting portion, wherein the mounting portions of said two rows of terminals extend to the same side of said insulative body and are arranged in one row. Because the mounting portions are arranged in one row, it is difficult to increase terminal number.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,726,499 discloses another type of electrical connector comprising an insulative body, a row of upper terminals and a row of lower terminals. The upper terminals and lower terminals are fixed to the opposite sides of the insulative body respectively so that the connector can retain more terminals to obtain high speed data transfer rates. U.S. Pat. No. 6,575,763 discloses an electrical connector assembly comprising an upper connector and a lower connector. The terminals of the upper connector and the lower connector attach solder balls thereon by Ball-Grid Array process and connect to the PCB (Printed Circuit Board). After the lower connector and the upper connector are fixed on the PCB, it is difficult to check if the terminals communicate with the PCB electrically because the jointing points of terminals and the PCB locate between the PCB and the insulative housing. Understandably, when these connectors of the above-mentioned patents are mounted to a PCB, the whole connectors are located above the PCB, which is undesirable in the circumstance where the heights of the components above the PCB are limited.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,764,338 discloses a mini DIN connector comprising an insulative housing and terminals. Each terminal has a mating portion received in a terminal passageway, a transitional portion extending upwardly from the rear end of the mating portion, a connect portion extending rearwardly from the top end of the transitional portion and a tail portion extending downwardly from the rear end of the connect portion. When the connector is mounted on the printed circuit board with an opening, two support portions in the lateral faces of the housing respectively stand on the upper surface of the printed circuit board beside the opposite sides of the opening, the free ends of the tail portions of the terminals are received and soldered in the plated holes of the printed circuit board. Thus the lower portion of the connector is located below the circuit board, thereby reducing the height of the connector above the printed circuit board. Obviously, this means is difficultly used to improve the connector of the above-mentioned U.S. Pat. No. 6,726,499, because the terminals is so dense that the safety space between the terminals are insured barely.
Therefore, it is desired to have an improved electrical connector to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art.